Well, I'm a mining engineer and worked in various capacities in underground coal mines to earn money while attending WVU's College of Mineral and Energy Resources (now merged with the rest of the engineering disciplines). I haven't worked underground for almost 15 years, but I remember everyone having a knife. Not everyone carried a hawkbill, but it was probably the dominant pattern.
I believe the ease of opening with a gloved hand had something to do with it, but not totally. I worked for one company that required the wearing of metacarpal padded gloves 100% of the time while underground, so for this company, only a pinchable blade worked. No nail Knicks, etc. Other companies I worked for issued gloves but did not require wearing them all the time (way better). Try threading a nut onto a bolt with a gloved hand....
At the later company, I saw a lot of multitools on mine belts, and a ton of hawkbills.
Here is why the pattern works in this environment.
-easy to open
-hard to make it close on fingers due to tip being below centerline
- for electricians and maintenance mechanics, a lot of electrical wire work is performed and big stuff at that. Some 4160v, 7200v wire. The mechanics can lay the cable on the ground, grip the knife and score the cable sheathing to expose damaged leads. This is done with one or two hands pulling the knife toward your body
-Also cutting rubber conveyor belting is a very hard pull cut.
-Another task is cutting mine bratice. Hawkbill works there as well.
-The only chores it wouldn't do well on would be pushing into a bag of mortar or other function that requires an initial push cut.
So the rigorous overhand pull cutting that requires a lot of force lends itself to the swayback hawkbill pattern in a coal mine.
Think of it like this, your on your knees, reaching one or two handed out in front of you and pulling with all your might back toward yourself. There are a lot of these type of cuts required to keep a mine running.
